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Bone Soldiers
The Bone Soldiers are a mercenary raider gang with a canibalistic bend. History The group known as the Bone Soldiers was formally founded in 2245, but the group goes much further back than just that. For decades, the original members of the group and their ancestors lived in and around the ruins of Red Bank, a Pre-War community in New Jersey on the banks of the Delaware River. These tribals were known for, among other things, their cannibalistic ways. They did not keep records, so when or why this tradition developed among them is unknown, but in addition to eating the flesh of their enemies, they also kept their bones, using them as weapons, armor, and adornments. These tribal lived as such until 2245, when a man named AJ Prince arrived in the ruins of Red Bank. Prince was a former Talon Company mercenary who had come north after leaving the group after refusing to listen to a woman commander. Like other outsiders, he was captured and held to be sacrificed and eaten, but unlike most others, Prince was extremely charismatic. While being held prisoner, he was able to sway his captors’ ears and gain an audience with the leader of the cannibals, Tomahawk. Tomahawk initially humored Prince in order to entertain himself, interested in playing cat-and-mouse with his prisoner before either killing him on the spot or sending him back to the stockades after getting his hopes up. The course of the conversation quickly changed as the tribal leader realized he underestimated his captive and that Price could be useful to him. Tomahawk presented Prince with a task that he considered suicidal. The cannibal tribals had long yearned to cross the Delaware and raze Riverbend, a small trading community on the banks of the river to their north. They periodically crossed the river but were always repelled by the community’s first line of defense: a large crane on the banks of the water in what had a Pre-War naval yard on the Delaware. If Prince could travel across the river and eliminate the old ghoul that lived in and still operated the crane, it would allow the cannibals free access across the river, into Riverbend. If Prince could guarantee them safe passage across the river, he be given his freedom. The prisoner was released and given a pair of guards to accompany him- guards he almost immediately killed as they crossed the river. Prince could have simply left, but he continued and crossed the Delaware, sneaking into the ruins of the shipyard. He knew the cannibals would slaughter the traders of Riverbend and was motivated by greed: he would recover the wealth they would no longer need. He successfully traversed up the crane, killed its keeper, and returned to the other side of the river to inform Tomahawk. The cannibals prepared for war immediately and set sail across the Delaware the very next night, attacking Riverbend in the middle of the night. Virtually every man, woman, and child that made the small trading post their home was killed that night. A notable exception were the gunsmiths of the Pistolvania Arms Company. From their compound in the ruins of the South Philadelphia Locomotive Works site, they repelled wave after wave of attackers. A parlay was eventually called for. Tomahawk was against a meeting, interested in throwing enough of his people at the compound until it fell but Prince convinced him to cease hostilities and see what the weapon makers could offer. Meeting with Samuel Stoltzfus, Prince not only ended hostilities with the gun makers, but engineered a mutually agreeable truce: the cannibals would not only leave the gunsmiths alone, but they would also provide them with a de facto protection. In return, the smiths would produce weapons and ammunition for the cannibals, free of charge. It was in this moment that most believe Prince became the leader of the cannibal savages, as they saw him as the man that got them an unlimited source of high-quality weapons and Tomahawk as the man who saw no value on their lives. Prince realized the shift, and in the span of a few months politically jockeyed himself into the leader of the group, reorganizing them as a mercenary raider group. He allowed the original cannibals to continue their man-eating ways while opening their ranks to outsiders interesting in killing and making caps. In an homage to their customs, he dubbed the group the Bone Soldiers. The group moved into the ruins of the Philadelphia Municipal Stadium and turned it into their base of operations. Over the next few decades, the Bone Soldiers grew in power. Prince organized them into something of a mercenary operation, taking on contracts usually to perform less than savory acts on individuals and groups. Clan Vernon was a regular, hiring the group to attack traders going to and from Atlantic City in an effort to disrupt their economy. While the men and women of the group profited, not all were happy. Though ousted from his position of power, Tomahawk remained in the group, acting as an advisor and confidant to AJ Prince. Though he worked with him, Tomahawk maintained a deep-rooted hatred of him that only grew as the years went on. Though not a schemer, he began playing the long game and planting the seeds for the elimination of his rival. In the 2260s, he saw the key to his plans in a young, charismatic, and deadly member of the group, a youngster by the name of Kenny King. King had been adopted and raised among the group after they raided a homestead and ate his parents and was particularly bloodthirsty. In 2264, he recorded his first kill, murdering a young boy in cold blood after he had stolen a box of sugar bombs that belonged to Kenny. In 2268, he became a full-fledged member of the Bone Soldiers, leading a raid on a small homestead across the Delaware in the ruins of New Jersey. In 2275, after Kenny raided a bunker belonging to the Followers of Einstein and recovered a cache of equipment, Tomahawk had the young main promoted to lieutenant and placed on the war council. It was there that he began whispering in Kenny’s ear, that AJ Prince was jealous, that AJ Prince was holding him back, that AJ Prince was old and getting soft and was going to eventually lose control of the Bone Soldiers. Kenny made his move in 2283. After a meeting of the war council ended, Kenny was able to keep Prince behind while forces loyal to him began murdering the men and women closest to Prince. As the leader of the group answered a question that Kenny had asked him, the younger man walked behind him, picked up a broom, and began choking out Prince, who was at this point in his late 50s. The leader of the Bone Soldiers was able to escape from the choke hold and get into a proper skirmish with Kenny, but the younger man prevailed in the end, jamming the broken, splintered end of the broom into Prince’s eye, puncturing his brain. Because Kenny had already eliminated the forces most loyal to AJ Prince and because he had Tomahawk’s implicit approval, there was no real pushback when he revealed what he had done. Already something of a mercurial personality, he renamed himself “King” Kenny and vowed to return the Bone Soldiers to their raider roots. In the years since, the Bone Soldiers have refrained from contracting themselves out, engaging in random acts of violence and destruction for the sake of it. The prize fights occurring in Thrilladelphia, which used to be more of a proving ground for young bucks, became a gladiatorial arena, with fights to the death for the amusement of those in attendance. The Bone Soldiers have stagnated into a state of hedonistic violence, with King Kenny more interested in fights and chems than raiding, preferring to let his lieutenants handle that. With his increasingly erratic behavior, Tomahawk is now worried that he made the wrong move in eliminating Prince in favor of Kenny, and is beginning to vet other possible leaders for the group should he stage a coup against the man he put in power. Membership The original Bone Soldiers were all part of the cannibalistic tribal group inhabiting the ruins of Red Bank. When AJ Prince was able wrestle control of the group out of the hands of Tomahawk, the allowed outsiders to join them. Generally speaking, only the most vile and villainous individuals were willing to work with the cannibals. Kenny Smith, the current leader of the group, has not changed their ideology much, but has put more of an emphasis on pointless violence and wanton destruction. Many think they are tough enough to join the group, but only the truly hardened and emotionless do; those that are invariably weeded out through the hazing process that joining entails are generally eaten. Activities & Interests Originally a tribal group, the Bone Soldiers were organized into a mercenary group of sorts under the leadership of AJ Prince. The label is not 100% accurate, as they were closer to a raider group than a mercenary company, but they did accept contracts from third-parties, generally to perform acts of violence on others. Since King Kenny has taken over, the group has taken the form of a raider gang, more interested in wonton destruction and senseless violence than money. The daily prize fights, which was a medium for men and women to prove themselves, have morphed into a gladiatorial arena that Kenny takes delight in. Relationships The Bone Soldiers are generally reviled by those living in the area. Their home and base of operations, Thrilladelphia, is a hive of scum and villainy, and the average wastelander is as likely to be killed and eaten or enslaved as they are hitting it big betting or fighting on the gladitorial fights. It is a place and they are a place best left avoided. Category:Groups Category:Raiders